I want to open an account interactive brokers to trade futures but don't have $40,000 min income which is futures trading Requirements. What should I do?
You better go find $40,000. And if that's all you have, I don't recommend gambling it all away on a futures account. Depending on the minimum tick size of a contract, you can be wiped out in less than a day if the market goes against you.
If you manage to lose 40k in half a day trading futures, you were going to lose all of that 40k no matter what you did in life.
The 40k minimum income requirement that IB asks for is answered by clients via the honesty system...in other words, it is up to you to be honest about your financial situation when applying. They do not check. They don't have access to your IRS forms nor do they ask to see your copies. These questions that arise during the application process is their way of determining that you are qualified both financially and intellectually to trade products that you may or may not understand. If it is not verified, why bother asking? So that when you blow up, you can't blame IB for allowing you to trade when you lied about your financial status and experience. Bottom line, you can put in whatever number you want if you will think it helps. They are just covering their own ass. Also understand IB requires 10k to open an account (unless you are a student). If your income is less than 40k, being able to piss away 10k may be a little hard to swallow. If you would like to trade futures, there are other firms that will allow lower deposits and better intra-day margins so that you don't have to risk so much before you realize you need to learn more if that ends up the case.
the important question is this: what experience do you have trading futures?..... If you have little or no experience trading futures, then you need to practice on a demo acct until you show CONSISTENT profits on a weekly basis. Theres no point in risking whatever money you have if you lack experience AND don't have winning strategy in trading futures. Once you have developed a winning strategy on a demo you can sign up with a broker like Mirus, Velocity, Amp, or IB, etc who will let you open an acct with as lil as $ 5k - 10k(depending o the broker) Trading the futures market is like being in a circus lion cage, no joke!! Ive been trading it full time for just over 4 yrs now. If you are unprepared, YOU WILL GET EATEN ALIVE....QUICKLY Good Luck....
Learn to spread trade - the margins are way less. For example, you get an 85% performance bond margin credit for trading the first month crude oil versus the second month crude oil. Look at the 'performance bond margin' section for any exchange's contract specs. In the bond margin spreadsheet, look for the "Intercommodity Spread Margin" tab. So, if the initial performance bond margin for CL is let's say $6,000, the CL J1: K1 spread is $6K x 0.15 = $900. I have had many clients seed accounts with $25K. Many. Spreads are very inexpensive to capitalize compared to directional flat price risk.
Find another broker. IB is not a good broker for futures. If you like commission, check out EOC. 5k to open account.